2019-10-06 - Where Are The Leads?!

Gabriel has a new case file open in front of him, pinching at the brow of his nose and furrowing all up at it. Yes, he is not having the easiest of days, it appears. But that is how it always is with a new investigation. It's unsolvable. Until it goes down. So here is hoping for inspiration.

"Is that the double homicide?" Cassidy asks hopefully after she's not so quietly or subtly stalked up behind Gabriel's desk, announced by the clacking of heels against the epoxy floor.

The blonde district attorney is professionally dressed in a white blouse and gray pencil skirt. A pager is clipped to the waist of the skirt. Her bag hangs from her shoulder. A tumbler of coffee in one hand.

Gabriel turns his head when Cassidy stalks up on him like that. "Who even wears a pager anymore? Don't you have a cellphone like a normal person?" That's a greeting. But he waves at the file in front of him. "No. This is a body on Bayside. I'm working some leads on the Sea View homicides, though. Seems like it might be linked to some kind of grab for the land."

"It's the homicide pager." Cassidy answers in a defensive tone. "A prosecutor is always on call in case it goes off. It's my week for it."

She peers at the file, rising to her toes to see it better from her vantage point. "Only one body? Any leads?"

"Can't you have a ... call list? And people have your cellphone number?" Gabe just laughs a little as he gets up from his desk, letting her peer down at the file. "Just one body, but it's part of a spate. People are talking about some sort of serial killer on the loose. I don't know. I just got the file from the Captain, so." He is still getting acquainted, it seems. "You want some coffee, Cassidy?" he asks as he moves towards the kitchenette.

"I have coffee, thanks." Cassidy shakes her tumbler and then takes a sip. "And I don't make the pager rules." But she follows Gabriel to the kitchenette.

"So I've heard. Nabbing the perpetrator can make someone's career around here. But this one is a mastermind, hmm?" She gives it a bit incredulously. "We can probably ask for help from Seattle PD."

"If we need it, I'll call in the reinforcements," agrees Gabe with a nod of his head. He's not going to have an ego about it. (Or too much of an ego about it.) "But we've got some solid leads on the Sea View double homicide. No suspects, but there is at least some motive starting to coalesce and some things shaking out. So at least the trail is hot." A wave to her as he pours his coffee. "What about you? How are you doing? Other than putting the bad guys away, obviously."

Cassidy wrinkles her nose at his lack of 'bite' at her (mild) ball busting. She takes another sip from her tumbler and gives her golden tresses a shake. "We're pleading out everything on the docket. It's all minor offenses. We need a big fish." She holds the mug with both hands at the level of her waistline. "What leads have you got? Do you have the crime scene photos? Anything more interesting than dead bodies and blood splatter?"

"We're waiting on forensics on the switch car that the shooter used." Cassidy would have been around murders long enough to know the lingo Gabe is using. A switch car is a stolen car that a shooter uses and dumps, to try to throw off the scent. "Also trying to run down leads related to this trout that keeps popping up. Vics were going to meet with an environmental or corporate lawyer. Something about selling, maybe." He walks back over to his desk, sipping his coffee and grabbing the murder book. "We've got pictures. Even surveillance tape. Shooter walks in, orders them to their knees. They comply. Probably think it's a robbery. Bang. Execution style. Both of them."

"So you think this has to do with the casino that's hanging fire?" Cassidy asks, intrigued, as she leans forward to study the file - regarding the photographs of executed victims with as much emotional attachment as one might have for an interesting knick-knack at a pawn shop.

"Casino?" asks Gabriel, furrowing his brow. That, apparently, he had not heard of. He, too, looks down at the photos for a moment, sipping from his coffee. "I don't know. I just got added to the case. It's Charlie's file, mostly, but I'm trying to help her run down leads."

"It's a building code case on the civil docket." Cassidy says as she stands and transfers her weight. "There is temporary injunction against the building of a casino. A corporate real estate mogul sued on an environmental basis to keep the land from being developed because of the Cutthroat Trout habitat in the harbor."

"Shit." Gabe shakes his head as he goes to grab his notebook again, looking to write this down. "So, wait. Where is this casino going to be built? Anywhere near the motel? This is the second time I've heard about the cutthroat trout in a few days. And the vics were going to meet with some environmental lawyer, so maybe this is all tied together somehow."

Cassidy raises her palms to Gabriel and takes a step back, "Whoa there. I don't have all the details about this. I just know it's on the docket and those are public record." She bends down and steals the pen from his hand, writing on a post-it. "Go to the courthouse clerk and ask for the filings..." she scribbles it down 'Pursley v. Foster'.

Gabriel takes the sticky note and nods his head, looking at the title. "All right. Interesting. And the Sea View has water front property and they were looking into meeting with a lawyer. So maybe they wanted to align with one side or the other. And, oddly enough, Clarissa Robbins was going to look into preserving the motel to prevent development."

"It could be worth pulling Joshua Foster in for some questioning." Cassidy says with a clear shrug, her usefulness at this point drying up. "I just need you gentlemen to serve me up someone I can charge."

"Well, we can also need help with warrants and grand juries and all of that, Cassidy. Don't sell yourself short." Gabe touches her shoulder for a moment, grinning at her. "But we've got some leads trying to find this lawyer they were looking to meet with and who it was. Once we got that, we can see if we need to bring someone in."

Cassidy shrugs his hand off her shoulder as she fishes for a menthol from her purse and places it between her lips. "Detectives file for warrants, not DAs." She shoots a playful glare at him. "And grand juries will indict a ham sandwich. So find me one I can charge."

"I'll be sure to get you one with extra mustard, Cassidy," promises Gabe, grinning at the assistant district attorney. "But seriously, I'll keep you posted on how it all goes. And." He tosses his head at her cigarette. "Get that shit out of here. This is a non-smoking building."

Cassidy pulls her lighter out of her purse in one hand, and way-too-big sunglasses out with the other. She flares are forearms apart at the elbows and sticks her head forward, "Where do you think I'm going? Sheesh." She unfolds the glasses with a flick of her wrist and tosses them on her face before turning around and clacking her way out, hips swaying as she walks with an exaggerated huffy gait. "Stop staring at my pager," she calls out without looking back.

"I like big beepers and I cannot lie, chica!" calls out Gabe at Cassidy's retreating form, even as he goes to sit down at the his desk once more, and the murder book in front of him. Time to going back to catching some bad guys.